it seems the older we get the more difficult it becomes to spontaneously make a new friend. we probably all have the experience of meeting someone new and thinking, "man, they're cool i would like to hang out with them". but if you're out of college and don't have school as a means for crossing paths frequently and establishing a pattern of witty exchanges or shared eye rolls, how do you make friends when you're a grown up? sure there are these new fangled social networks where you can click a button to add new friends to your life, but i'm not talking about that. i'm talking about seeing someone in real time in the real world and approaching them with actual words out of your actual mouth. radical, i know.
the youngest of my brood, g., is in kindergarten, where making friends is actually a part of the curriculum. being a bit of an overachiever she has made it her personal homework assignment to "make friends" with every single kid in her class. (she would prefer to also be the first one to make friends with everyone, but that is another issue:) she comes home each day with the 'new friend report'. it usually goes like this:
monday: " hey mommy, today i asked ben to be my friend, and he just looked at the floor and walked away.
tuesday: "hey mommy, today i asked ella to me friend and she said yes and we played pretend just-got-born-babies at the zoo"
wednesday: "hey mommy, today verinnia and sahetta got to be my friends because they played with me and i didn't even ask 'em to and i can tell they really like me a a lot so i didn't even ask 'em if they wanted to my friends because i just know they do. isn't that weird? (deep breath) their moms let them color on their faces and they make dots on their heads. how come you don't let me make dots on my head?" (they wear bindi's:-)
thursday: "hey mommy, guess what?!?! i asked ben again to be my friend and this time he said yes! i guess he was just shy before."
friday: "hey mommy, today i was gonna ask charlie to my friend but then he kept touching my hair so i didn't ask him"
ME: "which one is charlie, point him out to me."
G: "over there, jumping on that other boy"
ME: "hey chuck! this one here is my girl, keep your hands OFF! are we clear?"
based on the look of terror in his eye, i think we're clear.
everyday as g. is recounting her list of new friends and how she simply approached them each with one simple request, "will you be my friend?" i think, first of all, i'm raising one brave and confident girl! secondly, i wish grown ups could do that to (without seeming like a creepy stalker). i think we, as grown folks, are just so tied to conversation as a cornerstone of friendship that it becomes a lot more difficult. g. makes her request, gets an answer, and plays. often in silence, next to someone else. happy just to share the space and maybe the activity at hand. can you imagine if i tried that. let's say i see another mom waiting in the hall after school, and i've seen her each day. we have the same bumper stickers on our non-suvs, and we both wear keens. we are from a similar tribe and we both know it. we exchange the pleasant mouth-closed half-smile as we stand and wait for our kids each day. we even make some small talk from time to time about weather. let's say that my next move is to simply say to her, "will you be my friend?" and let's pretend (for the story's sake) that she replies, "sure". what then? can we silently go about our activities in tandem? side by side, without feeling awkward and uncomfortable? (sadly, the answer here is no). if you are in the workforce than the option for work friends exists, and you are guaranteed to have at least your choice of career in common, and that is pretty significant. if you are an at-home parent like myself than it's a little dicier. just being a parent isn't really enough to establish the lasting bonds of friendship. primarily because there are so many different ways to parent. i consider myself a progressive non-traditional mom type, which makes that pool of potential friends even smaller. fortunately for me i am blessed to have good friends left over from the school days/ work days when i made 'em, but some fresh blood would be nice to throw in the mix too. for a minute i thought it would be nice if there were some sort of "will you be my friend" personals. but that would never work because you would always wonder if people wanted to be your friend or if they wanted to be your (as my father says) special friend. ick. who needs the hassle.
the other issue is the issue of couple friends. my wifeband and i are very different, socially speaking. she could make pleasant conversation and deep connection talking to a catatonic. i, am a little more awkward. although i am known to be very vocal, i am initially pretty shy in social situations. i am closeted-shy i guess one might say. i feel uncomfortable when i first enter most social situations, but i fake it til i make it, have a glass of wine, and do my best. after you know me, as sure most readers here can attest to, it's hard to shut me up. "so i got that goin' for me, which is nice." (bill murray circa caddyshack) all of these factors make it difficult for us to meet other couples that we both connect to. i'll tell you this though, when we do meet them it's magical and wacky fun times ensue!
having good friends to rely on for laughter, advice, and just general merriment is one of the best parts of life. seeing g. boldly making new ones each day is inspiring. although they come along less frequently as adults, i am thankful for those friends in my life that i have weathered the years, hairstyles, fashion missteps, and stupid boys/girls with. and even though it makes me a little uncomfortable just thinking about it, i look forward to the friends i will (awkwardly) make in the future.
socrates? plato? buddha? nope, my gram. she has severe dementia and this was the pearl she dropped at her 81st birthday party last friday. the party was at the home of "mother" (aka: p.) and my dentist (her husband, but first he was my dentist). they served kfc and dairy queen cake (geez, even just recalling it there i puked in my mouth a little). if you're still with me i'll give you the guest list: me and my kids. my box-selling brother, his wife, and 2 princesses (trust me, the word 'daughters' wouldn't cover it). my birth sister (story for another day), her ex-husband/ soon to be next husband, and her hilarious son. and lastly, the star of the evening, my salty gram (quite an all american guest list) . gram lives in a nursing home at p's insistence and needs to taxi to gatherings these days as she is nearly bound to her wheelchair. she was late for her aforementioned soiree because she told the first taxi that came for her that she didn't need his help. and believe me, she's the kind of lady you listen to, even with dementia and a wheelchair. so a second taxi had to be called and the driver was told that regardless of her threats just load her up and haul her over because, after all, p. needs a new picture for her fridge of a dead eyed grandma and 5 plastic faced children forced to smile while wondering what that smell is coming from grams chair. my gram is a crusty lady who worked her whole adult life in a factory to support her family. she is a big swede who routinely broke her digits when i was young and was forever in one of those 'broken toe' clogs. she never chewed a whole stick of gum at once. she made me homemade underwear until i was 12 (i know),at which time i put my pre-adolescent fist down (read: i bought my own store bought undies with my babysitting money and she found out and made me feel guilty.) she was the only person in my family that i could tell really liked me a lot, and she let me eat doughnuts when p. wasn't looking. suffice it to say, i love my gram. she's a pain in the ass, but i love her all the more for it. i suspect she feels something similar for me. she was raised on a farm by a single mother in cambridge, mn during the great depression. her mother was only 1 of 2 people to not lose their farms during that time. my gram rebelled, like any good teenager, and rejected her mothers life to move to the city when she was 19. she married the biggest a-hole i have ever met and fought (literally) her way through life with him until he died about 6 years ago. she had 2 kids, one is p., and the other a son who died when he was 17. she wears her grief on her face to this day.
like i said before, my gram has dementia. she was diagnosed about 11 years ago when, shortly after retiring from the factory, she had a stroke that caused a terrible car accident. her mind has slowly (but steadily) been leaving her ever since. she relies on under paid workers to wipe her ass and take her to eat. she has lucid moments, and in those her enormous swedish eyes fill and run over with tears as she tells me, "it is hell getting old". i believe her. to be such a strong, independently willed and self sufficient woman who is reduced to uncontrolled bowels and not remembering who is dead and who is alive, let alone what day it is, has got to be a crazy kind of hell. at her party last week when she looked my brother right in the eye and asked if he "had ever been all of the way back to nowhere?" it wasn't the ramblings of a dead mind, it was the core of the truth that she is living with each day. she has slowly and painfully made her way back to the nowhere from which she came. from which we all come. if all is as it should be in the beginning of our "nowhere"we each start as someones dream, a glimmer in a soon-to-be parents eye. if we live a long life can it be true that we circle back to where we started? are we doing laps? and if, in fact, your beginning isn't so glorious that wouldn't really be the best of homecomings. on this return trip to nowhere, as the light grows dim and you find yourself back to where you started with a backpack full of a life lived, there seems to be a different sort of anticipation. my gram is terribly afraid of dying, i think this intense fear has actually kept her going through several near deaths over the last decade. a few times a year something happens and we all brace ourselves, prepare in our minds for that news, and always she pulls back through and hangs on a little longer to the world. her and i talk very openly about her death, something taboo to the rest of the family who subscribe to "every thing's fine" way of life. some days she says she just feels done, others she talks like she's waiting to take the drivers test so she can go back to work. i look around at what is left of her life and family, she has outlived every one of her siblings, friends, parents, and even one of her 2 children. the rest of us youngins are a small bunch and i'm the only grandchild who visits her. so what is she living for? what is she hanging on to? i suspect she doesn't really know. i suspect she is so afraid of what is on the other side of the curtain that she's rather just stay where she is. which speaks volumes to her fear as she lives, currently, in hell. no wonder her mind is shutting down. even so, she is still in there from time to time. for instance, when i arrived for a visit with her 2 days ago she was busy getting dolled up for an outing to a local restaurant with her fellow residents. she was in her new purple pants and purple sweater , and one of the staff at her nursing home was liberally applying dark purple eye shadow to her enormous eyelids. (i guess old women really do wear purple, huh.) gram looked at me from her purple haze and muttered, "i outta catch a live one looking like this". the next day i returned for another visit and asked how her lunch went, she snarked, "well, i can tell you this, i didn't get no live one". at least she can remember the content of our banter. i love witty banter, it's one of my favorite things. especially with my crazy, brash, sassy, salty, foul-mouthed, insulting, rude, and occasionally prophetic gram.
Sarah Palin's Speech Outline (
original copy- i swear)I. talk about my family. a. focus on the males. (one line about all 3 females should cover it) b. don't mention anything re: bristol's immaculate conception. i. pay fox news to zoom in on fake engagement ring that the big mac bought for her to wear.II. soundbite. a. keep it light, no need to delve deep right now.III. sarcastic quip. a. never mention "him" by name. "our opponent" will do.IV. soundbite (again, light on content+poorly educated public= fear based voting)V. sarcastic quip a. aim it for you-know-who (pause to gaze lovingly at youngest daughter while she licks baby's hair.)VII. soundbite.VIII. sarcastic quips x 4 ... and i'm done.__________________________________yea, that's about how it came off. and did anyone else notice her startling resemblance to tina fey? i hate to admit it b/c i heart tina fey to the depths of my soul, but it could make for an AWESOME season opener for SNL if they take advantage of this! i can just see amy poehler playing the five year old licking her hand and smoothing out the sleeping babies hair. which makes me think, how the hell was that baby sleeping? my kids woke up at that age if the floor creaked, they may have spontaneously imploded in that environment. did they dope him, do you think? she went back to work as the governor of alaska 3 days after his birth, so i wouldn't put it past her. 3 days!! c'mon people. seriously. seriously? SERIOUSLY!! seriously?? superserious? are you serious?serious.
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